Xbox Newsbeat 12/2/2016

Quantum Break Coming to Xbox One and Windows 10 on April 5

Time is Power!

With less than two months away until the highly anticipated launch of Quantum Break, Remedy Entertainment and Microsoft Studios kicked things into high gear with a number of huge announcements about the upcoming cinematic action blockbuster. The most noteworthy? Quantum Break will also be launching on Windows 10 on April 5…and will be available at no additional cost for those who digitally pre-order the game on Xbox One*.

Alan Wake Included with Quantum Break for Xbox One; American Nightmare Available with Pre-Order

Two of Remedy Entertainment’s most popular and critically-acclaimed classics – Alan Wake and Alan Wake’s American Nightmare – are now part of the Quantum Break experience. Every copy of Quantum Break for Xbox One will come with a full-game download for Alan Wake for Xbox 360, plus its two add-on packs, The Signal and The Writer, playable on Xbox One via Backward Compatibility. Fans who pre-order Quantum Break for Xbox One at participating retailers or through the Xbox Store will also receive a full-game download of Alan Wake’s American Nightmare for Xbox 360.

Pre-Order Quantum Break for Xbox One to Receive the Windows 10 Version at No Additional Cost

Xbox wants to empower gamers to play the games they want with the people they want on the devices they want, so Microsoft Studios and Remedy Entertainment will launch Quantum Break on Windows 10 simultaneously with the Xbox One version on April 5, 2016. Anyone who pre-orders the Xbox One digital version of Quantum Break through the Xbox Store, purchases an Xbox One digital token at participating retailers, or pre-orders an Xbox One Quantum Break bundle, will receive the Windows 10 version of the game downloadable at the Windows Store via redemption code.*

Action-Packed, Live-Action Trailer Shows Jack Joyce’s Desperate Struggle to Survive in a World in Chaos

To celebrate the upcoming launch of Quantum Break, Remedy Entertainment and Microsoft Studios also released a new, live-action trailer titled “The Cemetery.” Watch Quantum Break be brought to life as Jack Joyce (Shawn Ashmore) is hunted by agents from Monarch Solutions while he mourns the loss of his brother. But time isn’t the same anymore. It’s broken. And it’s the only weapon Jack has to survive a world in chaos.

Introducing the Xbox One Quantum Break Bundle

Xbox also announced a new Xbox One Quantum Break Bundle featuring a 1TB console and wireless controller, a full-game download of Quantum Break and a full-game download of Alan Wake accompanied by The Signal and The Writer add-on packs. The bundle will be available in Australia for $549 AUD RRP starting March 29, 2016. For more information, check out the full Xbox Wire post here.

Quantum Break is a unique experience; one part hard-hitting video game, one part thrilling live action show, featuring a stellar cast, including Shawn Ashmore (“X-Men”) as the hero Jack Joyce, Aidan Gillen (“Game of Thrones”) as his nemesis Paul Serene and Dominic Monaghan (“Lord of the Rings”) as Jack’s genius brother, William. Quantum Break is full of the vivid storytelling, rich characters and dramatic twists Remedy Entertainment are renowned for. Your choices in-game will affect the outcome of this fast-paced fusion between game and show giving the player a completely unique entertainment experience.

*Free Quantum Break Windows 10 game offer valid with pre-order of digital copy of Quantum Break for Xbox One, by April 4, 2016, from Xbox Store, Xbox.com, participating retailers, or inside Xbox One Quantum Break bundles, while supplies last (physical game discs are excluded from this offer). Quantum Break Xbox One codes purchased at retail and inside bundles must be redeemed on the console or at Xbox.com by April 4, 2016. Windows 10 game redemption code will be sent via Xbox system message around the week of April 5, 2016. For Windows 10 game system requirements see www.quantumbreak.com/windows10. Offer available in all Xbox Live markets except China.

To check out the full trailer and for all the latest news, please visit the Xbox Wire

The Halo World Championship Tour: Sydney Recap

Team Immunity and Exile5 to represent Australia and New Zealand in Halo World Championship finals

This past weekend, the six best teams from the Australian and New Zealand region met at the Australian Technology Park in sunny Sydney, Australia for the Halo World Championship Tour: Sydney. Once the final shot was fired, two teams were left standing with a ticket to meet the best in the world at the Halo World Championship next month.

Team Immunity asserts their dominance

Team Immunity came to Sydney as one of the best teams in the region. They also brought with them one of the top records at the event, a commanding 19-3 over 22 games. With a record like that, iM was not a team to be taken lightly, and they showed all weekend why their statistics are as good as they are.

iM drew a group with Team Exile5, and Team Reign, and made quick work of both, sweeping both x5 and Reign before making it to bracket play. They faced Authority as the runner-ups from Group A for the first time all season during the semifinals in a BO7 to determine which team would represent the ANZ region at Worlds.

Game 1, Strongholds on The Rig, was primed to be a good match as both teams came in undefeated on that map and gametype. Authority was beating teams on Strongholds by an average of 75 points and statistically looked like the stronger team. iM thought otherwise, and made a statement by winning 100-44.

Authority jumped out to an early lead in Game 2, Plaza Slayer, after overshield was burned and Wogggy got his hands on the sniper rifle and the next 8:42 were nothing short of nail-biting. With the score 49-49 in the closing seconds of the game, iM Seduce managed to get his hands on a new overshield as it spawned. With victory imminent, Seduce charged Wogggy, certain that he would net the last kill and give his team a commanding 2-0 series lead.

However, Wogggy made the play of his life, managing to melt Seduce’s overshield with a plasma pistol beatdown combo to give Authority to the win. Immunity would go on to win the next 3 games in poignant fashion, and qualify for the Halo World Championship along with advancing to the grand finals against Team Exile5 in a rematch from the group stages. But in that second meeting, the results were the same. iM was simply too much for x5 to handle and iM took the series 4-1.

Team Exile5 fights their way to Worlds

By coming in second place at the final ANZ Qualifier, Team Exile5 qualified for the Halo World Championship Tour: Sydney and exceeded expectations. They shared a group with the eventual winners of the event, Team Immunity, and Team Reign, who qualified for regionals at the AvT Auckland LAN.

After a first round bye in group play, x5 swept Team Reign 2-0 before getting a bit of their own medicine and being swept by Team Immunity. Their 1-1 record in pool play was enough for them to advance out of group play as the number two seed and to put them up against group A’s winner Team Prime in the semi-finals. Prime had only dropped a single game in group play, and entered their series against x5 with both confidence and momentum.

But that did not seem to matter to x5, as they went on to upset the higher seeded Prime with a final series score of 4-1. That series win earned them the right to represent the ANZ region along with Team Immunity at the Halo World Championship in March.

Entering the Grand Finals as an underdog against the best team in the region, Team Immunity. But x5 had to feel good about the first game type of the series, Capture the Flag, because x5 held an 11-0 record in CTF mode, and improved in Game 1 to 12-0, taking CTF on Truth 3-1. But x5’s luck ran out after that, as iM would win the next four games straight, and be crowned the winner of the Halo World Championship Tour: Sydney.

The weekend began with six teams full of aspirations to join the best in the world, but only two will make the trip to the Halo World Championship. Team Immunity and Team Exile5 have the talent and potential to perform well, and with the opportunity to represent their region on the biggest stage in eSports history, they will be playing with something to prove.

Since last December, when we first announced that RocketLeague was headed to Xbox One, new and existing fans alike have been asking us WHEN they could expect to see our soccer-meets-driving, sports-action hybrid come to the platform. As you can tell by our headline, we’re proud to announce that the answer to that question is next week – it’ll be available beginning on Wednesday, February 17.

RocketLeague has been a long time coming to Xbox One, and the team here at Psyonix is incredibly proud to be bringing it to you thanks to our development partners at Panic Button. With their help and expertise, we were able to bring RocketLeague to XB1 with a high level of performance and fidelity. Plus, as an added bonus for Xbox One players, we have also included three of our previously-released DLC Packs for free already-bundled into the game:

This past fall we rolled out a long-awaited update to Minecraft: Windows 10 Edition Beta & Minecraft: Pocket Edition – basic redstone components. Today we’re excited to let you know that we’ll be adding even more of the gameplay elements you’ve been eagerly awaiting to both of these editions with the Overworld Update coming by the end of this month. Yay!

Here’s what we’re adding in the Overworld Update:

Finally make more advanced mechanical contraptions for your world with additional redstone components. Comparators, repeaters, dispensers, droppers, hoppers, trapped chests and various additional Minecart types will all be available. Invent all the things!

Tangle with spooky witches and their huts during your adventures. Witch huts found while exploring swamps also now contain an exciting new feature – their cauldrons will be filled with a randomly generated potion that you can snag for your own if you’re feeling sticky-fingered.

Speaking of cauldrons, they can now be used to dye your armour an array of beautiful colors.

Display your coolest loot in your home with Item Frames – or mount your maps on the wall to plan your adventures with a world overview.

Other gameplay elements new to Pocket Edition and Windows 10 Beta are slime blocks, wearable pumpkins, red sandstone as well as improved chicken jockey mobs.

Even beyond gameplay elements, we’re also now introducing the ability to import and export maps into the Windows 10 Edition Beta, making it easier for you to share your favourite worlds with friends.

For more info on the new achievements on the Windows 10 Edition Beta, please visit Xbox Wire.

New DLC for Rise of the Tomb Raider

Explore deeper into the dark mysteries of the wilderness

A wealth of great DLC content continues to release for Rise of the Tomb Raider, most recently the Wilderness Survivor pack has been released. This new pack includes the “Nightshade” outfit that gives Lara the chance of looting an exotic animal resource from a common animal, the “Deathsong” Bloody Hatchet and a card pack with two guaranteed rare cards and three other cards that have an increased chance at being rare.

Also, if you’ve already finished Rise of the Tomb Raider’s main story and you’re looking for more, be sure to check out Baba Yaga: The Temple of the Witch, the latest DLC story for the game which adds hours of gameplay, and a new outfit and bow for Lara’s arsenal.

As Baba Yaga: The Temple of the Witch begins, Lara finds a survivor in Siberia, who tells her of a witch hidden deep within a forbidden forest known as the Wicked Vale. Lara ventures to find a missing man, and get answers… and discovers sights that she can’t explain.

Without spoiling the new story campaign, let’s just say that Baba Yaga: The Temple of the Witch plays out like a paranormal investigation. What’s causing people to disappear in these woods? Is it supernatural? Players will uncover new secrets – and more details about Lara’s past – as they try to solve the mystery. Walking houses, reanimated corpses, and her long-lost father pull Lara deeper and deeper into the Wicked Vale.

Baba Yaga: The Temple of the Witch is available now on the Xbox One store. It’s included in the Rise of the Tomb Raider Season Pass, which also contains the recently released Endurance Mode, as well as a third upcoming expansion. Don’t have an Xbox One? You can also pick up Rise of the Tomb Raider on Windows 10, available now.

To find out about all the newest DLC and to keep abreast of all the latest Rise of the Tomb Raider news, stay tuned to the Xbox Wire

Unravel: What Makes this Puzzling Platformer Unique?

Unravel debuts today on Xbox One and Windows PC!

Electronic Arts may be known for juggernauts like Madden NFL, Battlefield, and Dragon Age… but in the case of the all-new Unravel, the publisher knew that it had to stick up for the little guy. During last year’s E3 Expo, Patrick Söderlund, Executive Vice President of EA Studios, revealed that he was so impressed by the game when he first saw it that he immediately knew EA had to have it. Söderlund had come a long way to see this hidden gem – to Coldwood Interactive, a 14-person indie studio in northern Sweden. And we’re talking way north in a city called Umeå, closer to the Arctic Circle than Stockholm and on the same latitude as Iceland, Siberia, and Alaska.

A studio’s location isn’t always relevant to the games they create, but there’s clearly a close connection here. Coldwood creative director Martin Sahlin was inspired to create the game on a camping trip with his family in the wilderness outside the city, where he crafted an anthropomorphic twine critter named Yarny with some wire and a bright red ball of yarn. Sahlin subsequently placed his adorable new creation in all sorts of situations – crossing a stream, wandering by a lake – to figure out how this creature would potentially traverse the terrain in a game. You’ll see a whole lot of that inspiration onscreen in Unravel, and the game feels immensely organic as a result.

To find out about all the new features and possibilities, please visit the Xbox Wire

Hitman Brings Episodic Assassinations and Endless Options

A new addition to Hitman is Elusive Targets, a feature aimed at hard-core players

The Hitman series is on its sixth entry now, and the fan-favourite gameplay formula is a winning one. The simple joy of tracking down a target and taking them out as stealthily (or as bombastically) as you can isn’t something that’s easy for anyone to get tired of, but as games of all genres continue to evolve and expand, the development team at IO Interactive continue to update Hitman in new and unique ways.

IO Interactive is billing Hitman (yes, that’s its title – clean and simple!) as the first fully episodic game in the series. It operates much the same as other episodic titles, meaning that when Hitman launches on March 11, you’ll be able to play the first episode, and can purchase later episodes as they release throughout the year. It’s an interesting strategy for a big budget-game like Hitman – and one that may benefit players in some pretty cool ways. The developers will be able to look at player data, and use that to influence new chapters and additional content added to the already-released chapters. It adds an adaptability to the game that developers never get to experience, allowing IO Interactive to fine-tune the Hitman experience in real time.

Rainbow Six Siege has unleashed its first major content update, and it’s a doozy. Dubbed Operation Black Ice, this frosty downloadable content pack comes with a (free!) new map, two new Operators, and a host of game updates and fixes. Let’s take a look at what’s included.

You can check out Ubisoft’s official Black Ice page for a much more complete list of fixes and tweaks, but suffice it to say that the game is significantly improved – and it was pretty amazing to begin with.

RainbowSixSiege’s new map is available now for all players. The new Operators are free to Season Pass holders now, and will be available for purchase on tomorrow, February 9 for non-Season Pass holders, for 25,000 Renown (Siege’s in-game currency) or 600 Rainbow Credits. Just remember to bring your mittens!